The Misfit Mysteries
by mickiewazhere
Summary: Lily gets caught up helping her detective father find Andrew Vashon, a muggle who has been missing for over 10 years, but her friendship with James begins to strain. Can she solve the case and keep her 'friend? L/J. AU.


Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Drat. Drat. Double Drat.

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**Chapter One**

**My Beginning**

I'm not going to give you long excuses for my actions. I know what I did was wrong, but I couldn't help myself. One thing just led to another and I found myself becoming so absolved into it--

I'm getting ahead of myself. I need to start from the beginning.

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times… Actually, I think it was the summer before my sixth year at Hogwarts. Yes, that must have been when it all started because that was when my mother left.

It was, like I said before, the summer before my sixth year. My mother packed up her things and my older sister and left. She tried to get me to go, too, but I outright refused. I couldn't... I couldn't leave my dad alone.

"Lily. Lily! Stop dawdling and pack your things. We are leaving. Now!" She was standing in the doorway of my bedroom, hands on hips and lips pursed.

"I'm not going," I said dryly, turning back to the book that I was pretending to read. It was a self motivated attempt and looking like I didn't care about my mother's drama. Really, I was kind of shaken by the entire situation, and who wouldn't be? My mother was leaving and I wasn't going with her. She was pulling our happy little family apart. I didn't want to leave the safety of the house I'd grown up in and I definitely didn't want to help in this destruction of the Evan's family.

"_Lily_," she said in that long drawn out, warning way mothers are so good at. She was standing in my doorway, hands on hips. "We are leaving now and if-" I cut her off. I couldn't listen to her anymore. I felt like if I did, I might be tempted to go with her.

"I'm not going! I'm staying here!" I said it a bit more firmly then I meant to. I was simply trying to get my point through her think scull.

She shook her head at me and not one hair on her head moved. Even to this day, I have no idea how she always managed to make her dyed red hair so impeccably solid. "I don't have the energy to argue with you," she replayed flatly and then she walked away. That was it. No 'good-bye'. No 'I love you, Lily'. Nothing.

She and Petunia left an hour later and neither one of them said anything else to me and, as I sat at my window watching my mother's ugly little car pull away, I brooded over the entire situation. She hadn't been too exhausted to argue with me. As much as she had tried to hide it, it was obvious. My mother hadn't wanted to take me along. The entire reason she had left was so that she wouldn't have to take care of my dad and me anymore. She'd been hoping I'd say I didn't want to go.

I turned away from the window and wrapped my arms around myself and tried hard not to cry. I chewed my lip and forced myself to take deep breaths to steady my nerves. When I was sure that I wasn't about to cry, I shook my head. Why was this happening to me? What had I done wrong? Did _someone_ have it in for me?

And then it occurred to me: I wasn't the only one suffering. All the time I was so worried about myself, I hadn't even considered the one person who was probably just as shaken as I was.

Dad.

A took the stairs slowly and quietly. I chewed my lip again as I cautiously stepped into the front room. Dad was sitting at his desk, leaning over numerous manila folders, and scratching furious in one of his numerous notebooks. He was working. No surprise there.

Dad was always working. He lived his job. It was one of the things that drove my mother crazy. Dad worked long hours at and occupation that my mother considered illegitimate. (I personally think a detective is an incredibly legitimate job.)

One specific fight stands out in mind. It happened about a month before my mother left.

"Edward David Evans," my mother shrieked at Dad, arms waving, head shacking, hair not moving, as was my mother way. "Are you or are you not going to provide for this family?!" My mother grew up in a strictly traditional family and she believed that it was the man's job to 'bring home the bacon' for the family and the women's job to spend it. All of it. Apparently, detectives didn't make enough for that lifestyle.

"Well, I dunno," my father replied bluntly, not looking at her, and stroking his dirty blond mustache. "It really all depends on whether Mrs. Jerome admits to sending her son to a cult in Bolivia." He only seemed to be paying my mother half-attention, as he was going through the piles of notes he had made on the Jerome case. These notes all lived in the old role-top desk that sat in the corner of the sitting room under the window. It was customary for my father to read through all his notes before bed every night so that his notes would be fresh in his mind… just in case he had an epiphany in his sleep.

"Our family's welfare does not depend on Mrs. Jerome! Don't you want what's best for us? Me? Your daughters? How are we supposed to survive when you can't bring home any money for us?" My mother was full out yelling and she now had my father's full attention.

He turned in his chair and looked at her. "I make okay money," he stated sharply. A small crease appeared between my dad's thick eyebrows.

"We would have more and we would get it regularly if you had a legitimate job!" Please take note of the use of the words 'we' and 'you' in the proceeding sentence. There lyes the problem in their relationship.

"My job is legitimate," he shot back, his voice rising for the first time.

Mother, however, was off on a tangent, now. "Oh, I don't know why I didn't listen to my mother! 'Marry a rich man,' she said. 'You can do so much better,' she said. But, _no_. I married you! I thought you cared about me! I thought you loved me! But you don't, do you?" My father opened his mouth to respond, but mother wasn't paying attention and continued. After all, when a train is roaring on its way to destruction, you can't very well stop it, can you? "No. No. Of course you don't! How could I possibly think _my husband_ would care?" she muttered sarcastically, turning on her heal and storming out of the room.

My father just sat there watching at the place where Mother had disappeared. We could hear her upstairs complaining about him to my sister.

"Did that make any sense to you at all?" he asked me, his voice sounding worn and tired.

"Not really," I replied from my place on the couch.

"I didn't think so," he said with a sigh and he returned to his work

But, as I stood there watching him on the night my mother left, I realized how much my father had done… and did. He loved his job and did it the best that he could. He loved his children and took care of us as best as he could. He loved his wife and gave her the things she wanted as best he could. It just wasn't enough. It wasn't enough to keep our family afloat.

I stepped further into the room and cleared my throat. He glanced up at me then back at his work. I bit my lip and went to his side. "Wh-what are you w-working on?" I managed to force out.

He sighed and sat back, stroking his mustache. "New case." He shifted around some folders, opened one, and started skimming while he talked. "Rich aristocrat family is looking for their long lost son."

I relaxed slightly at the normality of our conversation. "Long lost son?" I asked, glancing over his shoulder at the notebook.

"Yep," he said through a sigh. Obviously, he was finding this case difficult already.

"Apparently he ran away almost 10 years ago and they want me to find him. I have a meeting with the boys mother first thing tomorrow."

"Oh," I said shortly and a stared down at the floor with my arms crossed over my chest.

Dad looked up at me quickly and studied my face. He knew what I was thinking. I didn't want to have to fend for myself while Dad was buried in this case, like all the other cases he buried himself. I wanted him here… with me. I needed him here with me.

"How about you come with me?" he asked me softly. He gave me a meaningful look. He was trying to go out of his way to make me happy. I was all he had left.

"Really?" I asked hopefully. I'd never been able to go with my father before. I'd always wanted to, but my mother never let me. She thought it was inappropriate for me to be involved in such a disgusting profession. (That, and she thought of women doing manual labor was sickening.)

"Yeah." He pushed out a smile.

"Yeah." I smiled, too.

We were going to be okay. It was just the two of us now, but that was okay. He was going to do his best to take care of me. And I was going to step up and do myself to take care of him.

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A/N: Woot! Finished! … Anyway, there's the first chapter of MM. Please, review cause I'm one of those annoying writers who won't update until I get reviews. Mwahahaha!!

Next Chapter: Lily first learns of Andrew Vashon and meets Mrs. Vashon.


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